AT THE ILOILO International Airport (my Airport #32, series of 2018), there are these two big posters with Dinagyang faces (or faces with Dinagyang costumes) and the brief messages: “Take care!/Halong!” and “See you again!/Kit-anay kita liwat!”
It made me think of a boy I fell in love with in Iloilo so I wrote the first of my November journey poems.
*
“I wanted to say ‘I love you’;
And you said, ‘Take care. See you again!’
I guess that can also mean
That you love me.”
*
I flew from Iloilo to NAIA terminal 3.
At the baggage claim carousel, I felt a longing.
The world was getting bigger.
I see different people all over the place.
I wrote another short poem.
*
“I see you everywhere.
But it’s not like you are there.
The heart sees what it loves.
Everywhere.”
*
I was shuttled from NAIA Terminal 3 to Terminal 1 for my flight to Shanghai.
I was feeling more homesick.
I left Dumangas right after its revelries for the 2018 Haw-as festival.
The moment I saw the backlighted marker that says Ninoy Aquino International Airport at Terminal 1, I knew I was farther away from the one I love.
I knew I had to write something.
*
“Love me when I say I love you
Because you don’t know
When I’m going.
And I will hate for you to cry
When I finally leave.”
*
At least 150 Facebook likes and followers reacted to the post.
At least seven gave it the teary faced emoticon.
At least 29 ‘hearted’ it.
I knew it was more than just wishing me a safe trip.
I knew people are with me in my emotional and love journey.
*
While waiting for check in, I scanned photos that I’ve taken since arriving in August.
I saw this 2015 portrait of mine.
I misplaced the portrait for some years now, and only saw it on the day I was packing for my trip home to the US.
I knew I had to post it so my followers will have something to see for the 12 hours I’ll be offline while onboard the plane.
*
Thinking of the boy I loved, I wrote this:
“If you really knew me,
You would love me
The way artists paint me.”
The post has earned at least 156 admirers.
*
At Pudong International Airport in Shanghai, I felt the world grow even much bigger.
I heard Chinese, French, Tagalog, English, even some Japanese.
I felt smaller.
And still, I felt my heart, but the love was fluctuating.
So I wrote something.
*
“Shanghai looks like a different world
And all I wanted was to be with you
Though you are farther to me
Than just miles away.”
*
For what is mere distance when you feel secure in someone’s love?
But this boy was unsure of his feelings for me.
I cannot blame him.
He’s just a boy waking up to (his) young, immature love.
And there I was confusing him with the love of the gods.
*
Pudong International Airport has this distinctive slants in its architectural design even from the outside.
Inside, there are slanting protrusions from the ceiling whose function/s I do not know.
They are pretty.
But I feel a certain sadness when I see them.
*
“Because all these spikes
These needles from who knows where
Are like nails, like daggers
Piercing my heart
Wounding each little square inch
To find you, though you are
Already long gone.”
*
While in flight, I already knew I had to make, and post, a poem for Airport #36, the Tom Bradley International Terminal of the Los Angeles International Airport.
I thought about the boy I loved.
And that poem, “The Taste of the Sea”, that I wrote for my French film “La Sirene”.
*
“The day I met you was the best,
And worst, day of my life
Best, because I knew
I’ll be loving you fiercely;
And worst, because I understood
You will never be mine.
But what is life if I don’t follow
My foolishly in love heart,
If I don’t love you fiercely
Though I know you’ll never be mine?”
*
My new base in Los Angeles is Chatsworth, California.
Right there by the Santa Susana Pass State Historic Park.
I live by big boulders in stony hills.
(See my Facebook post for a visual appreciation.)
If I be allowed one more poem here…
*
“When you refused my love,
You did not kill me.
You turned me into a rock.
I don’t know how you did it.
I didn’t want to be a rock,
Though my heart was bleeding—
And maybe my heart only meant
To stop its own bloody death.
Now, my heart still beats, pounds
Alive, again, but it is a heart
Harder than these rocks.” (500tinaga@gmail.com/PN)
